An ordinary man engages the circumstances of daily life, seeking to draw closer to the Mystery who gives meaning to everything.

Friday, July 26, 2013

It is Always Person to Person

Morning sun lights up the back of our estate. Its a morning full of blessings

The house is quiet, early in the morning. Its the only time of day that the house is deeply quiet. Everyone is sleeping except me. I've prayed my morning prayer, and now I'm sitting in my "home office" (my corner in the living room, with my "Daddy's chair" and my desk piled with papers and books and containers of my precious raw almonds, and gadgets -- and it must be said that in spite of everything, books still far outnumber the gadgets).

I sit here with my first cup of coffee, listening to the silence. I can hear the soothing sound of artificial ticking. It is our faux "antique" mantle clock, a true masterpiece of Chinese workmanship and design. The plastic body passes for genuine wood. The plastic face with its pretentious Roman numerals looks like gilded metal. A small battery keeps everything moving, and gives it a ticking sound that has nothing to do with the mechanism of the clock.

But as I survey the room and its spontaneous clutter (which is another way of saying "mess"), it is clear that this is a very real home. This is a house that is gloriously, raucously lived in.

Everything is given. It all seems still and silent in this moment, but it is a silence that breathes, from the presence of sleepers in their bedrooms to the tick of the quartz clock; from the errant sneakers that ought to be on the shoe shelf to the shafts of sunlight gleaming through the window. It is more dynamic that a roaring fountain. It is all, right now, coming forth from an inexhaustibly generous hand.

I've been writing less, and spending more time reading during work time these days. I am slow at everything, and I grow tired very easily, but I know that my days are about more than just trying to survive. I am being educated toward the most important work of my life. Indeed, it is a work that has already begun.

I write to communicate. My energy is drawn from my awareness of the persons who read these words, from the realities that I perceive, and from the connections that I see everywhere, and that I desire to share with my readers. Whether those readers are many or few is not so important. I craft various kinds of writing on different interactive media platforms, but I can keep my focus insofar as I remember that what is taking place is person to person communication. Even here, I am not writing to an "audience" -- I am giving something, sharing something that I see with each person who reads these words.

I do not know what people take away from these words, and they are often clumsy compared with what I wish I could say. But all I can do is summon my energies and give what I have been given.

I want to give what I have been given, but what happens to these gifts -- how they are received and what kind of fruits they bear -- is in the hands of God. Indeed, I myself am in His hand. Every person is a gift for others, and therefore every person has gifts to share. Every person matters. Every person has beauty.

The summer sun is brightening up the whole room.

All things are gifts from God to us, and we are gifts from God to one another.

love

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About Me

John Janaro is Associate Professor Emeritus of Theology at Christendom College. He is a Catholic theologian, and a writer, researcher, and lecturer on issues in religion and culture. His most recent book is NEVER GIVE UP: MY LIFE AND GOD'S MERCY. He is married to
Eileen Janaro and has five children.

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